3.30.2012

■ Immortal Bird (Doron Weber)Memoir. I loaded Immortal Bird onto the Kindle after reading a favorable review in Entertainment Weekly. The memoir deals primarily with the illness and death of the writer's oldest son, Damon, particularly the ways in which healthcare professionals failed to provide consistent diagnoses and appropriate care. The book is also Weber's love song to his son, and it may simply have been too soon for him to pen those lyrics. In a nutshell? I wanted it to be a better, emotionally truer book than it was. Weber's wife and other two children are, at best, tertiary characters in this "family memoir," and Damon is so over-praised that he fails to become real to the reader.

■ The Scarlet Pimpernel (Baroness Emmuska Orczy)Fiction. With the Misses, followed by the 1982 movie ("Sink me!") with Ian McKellan as Chauvelin and Jane Seymour as Marguerite. A re-read for me.

■ Sister (Rosamond Lupton)Fiction. An Amazon Best Books of the Month selection in June 2011, this beckoned to me from a table at Barnes & Noble when we were in Chicago for A Midsummer Night's Dream. A beautifully written blend of family drama and murder mystery, this was an altogether satisfactory book.

■ The Taming of the Shrew (William Shakespeare)Play. Another re-read, with the with the Misses, in anticipation of this. Can it really be five years since I last read this? Related entries here and here.

A note about the archives

It's true: I've moved most of the nearly ten years' worth of posts and photos into draft folders. Why? For many reasons. If there is a topic or post from the past that you want or need, though, drop me a note; I'll see if it can be reworked and/or resurrected.